Page 4 of The Beast's Broken Angel
Dad got weaker as they continued. His answers made less sense, his body not responding as much as the pain broke through his limits.
The leader noticed it wasn't working anymore: “Subject reaching unresponsive state. Get the final account sequence before he's too far gone to talk.”
I watched Dad gather his last bit of strength, lifting his head with enormous effort to look at me, silently telling me things the men couldn't understand.
His voice, rough and bubbling with blood, forced out a final message: “Adrian. Be stronger than them. Survive. Remember who did this.”
The words came out clear despite how hurt he was, making sure I understood while sounding to his killers like a normalgoodbye. The leader laughed, showing real emotion for the first time all night, the sound completely empty of anything human.
“Touching last words. But totally useless. Your family ends tonight, Calloway. Your name gets erased from both the business world and the underworld by morning. Complete elimination prevents future problems.”
My eyes locked with Dad's across the room, saying more than words could. His eyes gave me final gifts: permission to survive by any means necessary, approval for future revenge, love that would continue even after he was gone.
The gunshot was quick and businesslike. No dramatic pause or extra cruelty, just getting the job done. The leader himself fired the perfectly placed shot that killed Dad instantly rather than letting him suffer more.
I watched Dad's body slump forward, blood spreading across his pyjamas in a pattern like the inkblot tests in my psychology picture books.
Their comments after killing him seemed completely disconnected from the fact that they'd just murdered someone: “Primary objective complete. Start clean-up. Extraction team needs us done within ninety minutes.”
The sharp chemical smell reached me before I saw what they were doing. They were pouring gas or something all around the bedroom, making sure it would burn well. The smell came through the closet slats despite the cedar, the gasoline scent making me understand immediately what they planned.
I watched through the thin slots as the leader supervised the evidence destruction with the same care he'd given the torture.
“Make sure you soak all the important areas,” he told the others. “Blood spots, fingerprint surfaces, DNA spots.”
The blue-eyed man poured extra accelerant on theelectronics and papers, showing he knew exactly how to destroy evidence. The leader talked casually while they worked:
“Burn it all. Make it look like an electrical fire that started from the master bedroom panel. The kid stays locked in the closet. Calling him 'collateral damage' makes the story cleaner for the investigating cops.”
The casual dismissal of my life as “collateral damage” and a way to make their story better showed how little human life meant to them. They were efficient, wasting no movements, not talking unnecessarily, showing no feelings about the horrible things they were doing.
I clawed desperately at the closet door as the first flames appeared. They lit the gas trails in a pattern designed to look like an electrical fire instead of arson. The special lock on the closet door, meant to protect Mum's jewelry, was too strong for my child's strength to break.
The irony hit me later: the security meant to protect us was now ensuring my death.
The flames spread frighteningly fast, showing they'd used professional-grade accelerants chosen to burn everything quickly, including bodies. I watched in horrified fascination as my parents' bed caught fire, the Egyptian cotton sheets where Mum had read me stories during thunderstorms now turning into a funeral pyre.
The fire moved exactly how they planned it, creating a rapidly closing window for me to survive.
I gave up all dignity, pounding on the door with my small fists and screaming for help that couldn't possibly come. My basic survival instinct took over, even though my brain knew it was hopeless.
The blue-eyed man paused by the closet, listening to my screams with his head tilted curiously, like a scientist observing a lab rat.
“Kid's still aware,” he noted to his friend nearby. “Still thinking clearly despite the situation. Interesting.”
Reducing my terror to an “interesting” observation became my standard for true evil, the marker against which I'd measure all future monsters.
Smoke started coming through the air slats, filling my lungs with toxic chemicals and burning materials. It stung my eyes and burned my throat, each breath giving me less oxygen and more poison.
The horrible realization that I might suffocate before burning provided no comfort, just a different way to die.
The fast-moving fire created a strange, terrible beauty. Flames in blues, oranges, and occasional greens from burning chemicals making a kaleidoscope of death coming closer and closer.
Through the thickening smoke, I saw the team leave. Job done, they evacuated in an orderly way, not wasting time watching the consequences of what they'd done.
Their leaving created a weird loneliness, a child dying alone while his killers walked away without seeing the end of their murder.
My terror started changing to resignation as I got less oxygen. Dizziness replaced panic, a strange calm coming over me despite things getting worse.
